


but then my homework was never quite like this

by FrenchTwistResistance



Category: Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (TV 2018)
Genre: F/F, I just want caos to be a sitcom where hot middle-aged ladies kiss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2019-09-08
Packaged: 2020-10-12 08:40:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20561438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FrenchTwistResistance/pseuds/FrenchTwistResistance
Summary: Hilda convinces Zelda to give Sabrina a choir solo.





	but then my homework was never quite like this

**Author's Note:**

> September group chat prompt: Hot for Teacher.

“Just because she’s my niece doesn’t mean I can give her all the solos,” Zelda says from behind a newspaper. She’s reclined on the davenport in the parlor with her pumps off, her feet propped on an ottoman. 

It’s raining steadily, and the public radio station is just barely murmuring an interview with one of those horrible neo-folk bands Hilda likes interspersed with samples of their dissonant attempts at Appalachian harmonies and anxiety-inducing banjo arpeggios.

Hilda’s on her hands and knees, stoking the fire, and she looks over her shoulder for her rebuttal:

“Well of course. But you didn’t give her even one solo!”

Zelda scoffs and flops the newspaper onto her lap.

“You weren’t there at auditions, Hildegard. You know I love Sabrina, but she was pitchy.”

Hilda sits up on her knees on the hand-woven rug in front of the fireplace.

“Bollocks! Sabrina’s voice might very well be called tinny or uninspired, but she’s never once in her life been pitchy!” Zelda narrows her eyes, just this side of rolling them, says,

“Regardless, it’s my decision.”

“A poor decision, at that.”

Zelda takes off her reading glasses in a dramatic huff. She’s losing this non-argument, so she changes tack:

“How do you know she even wants a solo? She’s never expressed that sentiment to me, the woman who could grant her one.”

Hilda’s still on the rug, but she squares her shoulders:

“She and I have plenty of time to talk while you’re at the Academy—” Now Hilda narrows her eyes, says suggestively, “—practicing your accompaniment.”

Zelda finally does roll her eyes.

“Do you really think so little of me, sister?”

Hilda hums as she considers, juggles a few blue phrases, decides on,

“You’ve been known to follow your base instincts rather than your rational brain.”

Zelda laughs, says,

“You have quite the idea of me, don’t you?”

They look at each other, and something passes between them.

The fire pops and fizzes. Thunder claps. And the radio program goes to a commercial for a local vineyard.

“Tell me I’m wrong,” Hilda says.

“I wouldn’t dare give you any such satisfaction.”

Hilda purses her lips, and her knees creak as she stands.

“Well. We’ll see about that,” Hilda says as she sits deliberately at the far end of the davenport and takes up her crossword puzzle book.

A beat and then Zelda’s processed the comment long enough to say,

“See about what?”

Hilda giggles. It could be about the 6 across she’s penning in neat capital letters, but Zelda has her doubts. She almost forgets her own question before Hilda replies off-handedly,

“Your daring to give me any satisfaction.”

Zelda raises an eyebrow, but Hilda’s not looking at her; in fact she’s staring into the middle distance, tongue between her teeth in contemplation, trying to remember the capital of Ukraine for 14 down. Zelda clears her throat, says,

“I might be persuaded to reconsider…”

“Kiev!” Hilda says.

Zelda admits—to herself, at least—defeat by indifference and returns to her newspaper. The radio program returns to a perpetually out of tune drone string and some probably unwashed hipsters discussing the deeper meaning of their trite lyrics.

xxx

Zelda doesn’t have an office, per se.

She’s an adjunct professor at best, a substitute teacher at worst, and so she has a desk in a corner of the glorified closet where they store the musty old choir robes they had retired five years ago (a good ten years after choir robes had fallen out of fashion generally).

But still. She likes having her own space, a small room with her name on the door—however temporarily—somewhere students can come to complain about particularly athletic runs in the cantatas she enthusiastically directs. She has her own ideas about how dexterous young voices should be, and she enjoys putting incipient divas in their respective places.

Once in a while an angry parent will cross her threshold. But she’s not a summoning teacher. She’s not a potions teacher. Her class will not pass or fail a student, will not affect a student’s future in any way on paper. She has a lot of freedom in this way. Who cares that she doesn’t have a real office when she doesn’t have to worry about midterms?

xxx

Hilda knows it would mean a lot to Sabrina to have a choir solo—not just the attention from her peers and the audience but also the validation from her rigid aunt.

She tries not to use her empathetic abilities around her family, but sometimes things accidentally happen.

Hilda also knows Zelda and what makes her tick.

She tries not to use her empathetic abilities around her family, but sometimes things accidentally happen, especially after centuries.

xxx

Zelda’s at her desk rewriting a messy mezzo line. There’s a knock at her door. She thinks it might be a surly third year who had been erroneously convinced he was a tenor she’s recently re-assigned to baritone and calls for the person to enter. The door creaks open and then shuts silently. 

She’s still looking at sheet music.

“Yes?” Zelda says.

Zelda looks up over her reading glasses and drops her pencil at what she sees.

Hilda’s draped on her doorframe in a low-cut, form-fitted, sequined, midnight-blue cocktail dress. No bra in a 100-yard radius.

Hilda readjusts against the doorframe. It’s an awkward readjustment—all flailing limbs and winking with both eyes. But the ending tableau is quite sexy. It had taken several tries to get to this point, but when it does, Hilda is showing off her best attributes, a seductive look on her face.

“I’d like to discuss something with you, Miss Spellman,” Hilda says, once she’s finally in position with her breasts jutting just so.

Zelda takes off her reading glasses, inspects Hilda’s form, finds herself confused and turned on. She doesn’t exactly know what to make of this spectacle except that she appreciates it and that Hilda’s here, trying something. What thing? Who knows. But she’s cottoned onto that Hilda’s some character, and that won’t work unless she’s a character, too.

“How do you know I’m a miss rather than a misses?” Zelda says.

Hilda blinks, but she doesn’t miss a beat, says,

“I’m very intuitive.” Zelda says,

“Aren’t you just?”

Hilda flutters her eyelashes and then sits in the wooden chair on the other side of Zelda’s desk. She makes a show of crossing her legs. 

They live together. They work together. They sometimes share a bedroom. But Zelda hardly ever sees her legs. She allows herself to see now, watches the skirt hitch up, watches the knee flex and cross, dips her view to the languid calves and slack, slim ankles, shapely even though they’re not even involved in this particular act.

“About our discussion—” Hilda says, swiping her tongue over her top teeth.

“Let’s be clear,” Zelda says, playing along against her better judgment. “I can’t be bought.”

“I wouldn’t presume,” Hilda says. She leans over the desk, pendulous and confident. She husks, “But can you be rented?”

“Any decent rental requires a security deposit.”

“I have plenty of liquid assets for just such an occasion,” Hilda says.

Zelda clenches her thighs together under her desk, says,

“Oh I’d put money on that. What would you like to discuss?”

Hilda reaches across the desk to Zelda’s cigarette case, flips it open. She takes a cigarette between her fingers and taps it three times on the polished pine of the desk. She brings it to her very red, painted mouth, says,

“Light me up, Miss Spellman?”

Zelda opens her top drawer, produces a matchbook. A zip. Sulfur. Smoke. Hilda does her best not to cough. She blows a ring and then reclines further in the wooden chair. The right strap of her dress slips down her shoulder.

“What do you want from me? And what are you offering in return?” Zelda forces herself to say instead of just watching Hilda’s lips caress the cigarette filter.

Hilda recrosses her legs, pulls her errant strap up. Zelda watches and waits.

“I think you know,” Hilda says.

“Maybe I do. But I’d rather you elucidate.”

Zelda brushes her fingers against Hilda’s as she takes the cigarette from her. Then. A slow drag. A hazy cloud in the tiny office-not-office. Hilda’s tracing her fingertips against a knot in the pine desktop. She says,

“A three-hour cantata has so many solos. Just sixteen bars would suffice for my niece.” 

“So. That’s what you want,” Zelda says. “But what do I want?”

“I think you know,” Hilda says, her voice pitched so low. When she’d been a singer she’d been a soprano, but now. Now it’s a cabaret alto growl. Zelda’s never been able to resist a cabaret alto, especially an especially busty one in a tight dress with no discernible underclothes. She tries not to pant as she says,

“But what if I don’t know? What if I need you to teach me?”

“You’re the choir mistress here. If I need to teach you, I ought to be getting paid.”

They both pause and blink.

“Direct deposit?” Zelda finally says.

They look at each other, and something passes between them.

Hilda opens her mouth to execute a cutting witticism, but Zelda speaks first:

“Full disclosure: I’m not as interested in your routing number so much as I’m interested in your tits.”

Hilda visibly reels and then recuperates—the whole journey in cut time. She says,

“Would’ve put money on that.”

“It seems we’re both betting women, then,” Zelda says.

“Actually. Neither of us are betting women,” Hilda says. “Because we both know how this ends.”

“I’m not entirely convinced,” Zelda says.

“I’d’ve put money on that, too,” Hilda says. She rounds the desk and drops to her knees.

**Author's Note:**

> But also maybe I’m a snob who crypto-rants about that terrible masquerade number and Mumford and Sons in the same breath.


End file.
